Following a heart op to fit a new valve about 10 years ago I take a blood thinner called Warfarin (rat poison).
This requires regular blood tests and makes it very hard to be away for more than say 1 month.
My doctor says that there is now a machine I could take with me if I travelled and self-test and then adjust my dosage accordingly.
This is totally great news for me and wondered if other people have to take medication of this nature and how they get on ?

Hey there--my hubby just had a scare with a TIA and they considered putting him on a similar med but decided against it because of our lifestyle. He's on aspirin now. There is another med (don't recall the name) but it can be prescribed instead of warfarin and the effects stop immediately when you stop taking it. Doesn't require the same sort of blood test/monitoring either.

A cruising friend of ours is on warfarin and he has just checked in various ports to get blood tests. He said he first went on warfarin right before a trip from California to Patagonia. He went two months without testing that trip but all was OK. The tests are less costly just about everywhere besides the USA, btw. The important thing is not to vary the quantity of alcohol, green leafy veggies, and a couple other things which have vit. K that impact warfarin. He's very careful of that sort of stuff and has been using warfarin for 15 years or so.